Novell Ships SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 Service Pack 1 and New Virtual Machine Driver Pack

SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 SP1 and Virtual Machine Driver Pack contain several innovations, many of which came from direct collaboration with customers and partners

18 June 2007

Novell today announced that the first service pack (SP1) for SUSE® Linux Enterprise 10 is now available to customers worldwide. Featuring significant enhancements in virtualization, high-performance computing, security, interoperability and system management, SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 SP1 from Novell® lets organizations take advantage of the latest technical advances in the best-engineered, lowest-cost and most-interoperable platform for mission-critical computing.

Novell today also announced the commercial availability of the SUSE Linux Enterprise Virtual Machine Driver Pack, a bundle of paravirtualized network, bus and block device drivers that enable unmodified Windows* and Linux* guest operating systems to run with near native performance in virtual environments created with the Xen* hypervisor technology integrated in SUSE Linux Enterprise and Intel* Virtualization Technology and AMD* Virtualization hardware.

"SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 SP1 gives us the opportunity to create cost-effective solutions for our customers who are running different platforms," said Jan Aril Sigvartsen, CEO of hosting provider WebDeal. "For example, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server gives us the opportunity to run the same distribution on all our different architectures, while virtualization lets us easily run more than one operating system on the same hardware and move this virtual system around in our data center without downtime. This has been a cost-effective solution for us."

Service Pack 1 Enhancements

SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 SP1 enhancements include enhanced virtualization support and management, updated high-availability storage infrastructure and support for new processor technologies, including Quad-Core Intel Xeon* and Quad-Core AMD Opteron* processors. It also has enhanced security features, audit subsystem enrichment and support for Novell Open Enterprise Server 2. For the desktop, SP1 features expanded OpenOffice.org support and an updated desktop user experience, along with a desktop virtualization technology preview and advances in enterprise integration capabilities.

Benefits of Virtual Machine Drivers

With the release of the SUSE Linux Enterprise Virtual Machine Driver Pack, Novell becomes the first vendor to offer a supported solution for Xen virtual machine guests. The driver pack brings the performance benefits of paravirtualization and enterprise-level support to a wider range of fully virtualized workloads, giving customers more choice and flexibility and enabling them to run legacy applications on newer, more powerful, energy-efficient hardware.

The Virtual Machine Driver Pack includes drivers for Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows 2003, and will ship in July. Drivers for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 and 5 will be released later this summer and will be added to the driver pack at no additional charge via maintenance update. A one-year subscription to the Virtual Machine Driver Pack will cost $299 per physical server for up to four virtual machines or $699 per physical server for unlimited virtual machines. Xen drivers for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server are already available and ship as part of the SUSE Linux Enterprise distribution.

Holger Dyroff, Novell vice president of SUSE Linux Enterprise product management, said, "The enhancements in SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 SP1 and the capabilities of the Virtual Machine Driver Pack are a direct result of customer feedback and Novell's commitment to meeting their needs. In many cases, we have been collaborating directly with customers to develop these new software features. As enterprise adoption of Linux grows, so does Linux development and innovation. The sky is the limit in terms of the capabilities of enterprise Linux."

The next-generation platform for the open enterprise, SUSE Linux Enterprise is the best-engineered, lowest-cost and most interoperable platform for enterprise computing, from the desktop to the data center. For more information about SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 SP1 and the Virtual Machine Driver Pack for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10, including pricing, subscription and support options, visit www.novell.com/linux.

About Novell

Novell, Inc. (Nasdaq: NOVL) delivers infrastructure software for the Open Enterprise. Novell is a leader in enterprise-wide operating systems based on Linux and open source and provides the enterprise management services required to operate mixed IT environments. Novell helps customers minimize cost, complexity and risk, allowing them to focus on innovation and growth. For more information, visit www.novell.com.

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